Blink and you'll miss it
by You talk like a dentist
Summary: She moved into the townhouse with low expectations. Moving always made her sad, it's why she didn't do it often. She'd gone from her parents' house to her shared flat during Uni and then stayed there until now. So, pretty low expectations from 221B. It was a house but not a home. But she didn't expect it to be a madhouse.
1. Chapter 1

_1_

* * *

She was nervous. Shifting from one foot to the other, she stood outside the townhouse that was to be her home and just looked. It was a nice enough place. Of course, she had thought that back when she'd first seen it too.

But she was going to be living there now. All alone too. Except for the mysterious flatmate Mrs Hudson had mentioned once or twice.

For a moment she thought of the flat she'd shared with Brigitte since she was eighteen and wilted. Still, no way around it, now that Brigitte and Carter were engaged they would of course, want to live together. She missed it already and she'd only not been a resident there for forty-five minutes.

Ophelia finally just shook her head and used the key she'd been given to open the door. Mrs Hudson greeted her with a smile.

"Oh how lovely, you're here! I was hoping the boys would be here to welcome you but it seems they're out for the moment."

"The boys?"

"Dear Sherlock and John, they're the other tenants."

She blinked. She'd heard those names before. Together even.

But where?

The couple from work Brigitte was telling her about, the ones who were fighting all the time now?—she wondered as she climbed up the stairs.

No, wait, they were fighting over the fact that one of them wanted them to start living together, couldn't be them.

Ah, yes, she'd overheard something about a Sherlock and John at Carter's sister's wedding. Either that they were always at the scene of a crime or that it was a crime they weren't together. Ophelia figured it was the latter. It took a morbid person to talk about crimes at a wedding.

"Although," She said out loud, paused on the stair landing, "Carter's uncle is a detective at Scotland Yard or something."

Food for thought.

She shook it off and ran up the rest of the stairs, a sudden burst of energy rushing through her as she carried the trunk with her and let herself into her new bedroom. It was nice enough, very old school though. Soft cream and blue fleur-de-lis wallpaper, dark wood furnishings and all that jazz. Not at all like her stone tiles and sleek chrome book shelves at the old place.

It wasn't unexpected of course, it's not like she hadn't already looked over the flat. But it was only striking home now how different everything was going to be.

The boxes she'd sent over earlier were waiting to be unboxed and rolling up her sleeves she began the arduous process of unpacking.

* * *

She made her way down the stairs tentatively. There were raised voices, a woman sitting in the armchair with a baby in her arms, watching as two men argued. Ophelia curled in on herself. She didn't deal well with yelling, it took her back to the horrid fights her parents would have before they got divorced. It was much easier to deal with yelling when she was the one doing it.

"I swear to God Sherlock, I'm going to kill you!" The shorter of the two, blond and red with anger, shouted.

The other one, tall and brunet, just scoffed in response. "Oh, where have I heard that before?"

"Everywhere you've ever been I'd imagine." The woman said coolly, her hand poised over the baby carefully, more than a little amused.

"I cannot believe you woul-Oh, hello." The man doing the yelling said.

Ophelia's eyes flicked between the three people, all now staring at her intently, all looking ready to attack at the drop of a hat.

"...Hi. I'm the new tenant?"

"New te-Oh, Mrs Hudson mentioned that, you've taken up my old bedroom, I believe." The blond man said.

 _Old_ bedroom, good. That meant he didn't live here and she wouldn't have to live with constant fights. Ophelia relaxed and smiled in answer but the smile froze as another thought occurred to her.

What if the reason it was his old bedroom was because he'd moved into the brunet's bedroom?

"Oh, wipe that look off your face, he doesn't live here anymore." The dark haired man snapped at her.

"No, John just likes to have his little lover's tiffs here," The woman said, clearly amused, "Says our house is too nice for that sort of thing."

Ophelia blinked. What sort of madhouse did Mrs Hudson run?!

And what the hell had she done to qualify for it?

"Right. Umm, I'm Ophelia by the way," She said awkwardly.

"John." The man who was yelling held his hand out.

"Mary." The woman said and tilted the baby up a bit, "And this is Amelia."

"When's your friend getting married?" The dark haired man said in lieu of his name.

Ophelia blinked. "They haven't set the date yet. I'll let you know when they do."

The man frowned and leaned in to look at her closer.

"Odd." He observed.

Ophelia didn't say anything. She wanted to ask him just what he meant by odd but she had a feeling she wouldn't like the answer.

John had no such qualms.

"What's odd?" He began looking at her suspiciously, which was a bit much. She wasn't the one acting crazy, where did he get off standing in judgement of her?

"People usually ask me how I know things about them." He continued his scrutiny of her, now going so far as to rest his index finger under her chin lightly and turn her face this way and that.

"You should ask people for permission before manhandling them." She informed him once he pulled back.

"Dull, much easier to say sorry later on. Don't even need to mean it."

She took a healthy step away from him and turned back to the rest of them.

"Please tell me you're all in therapy."

Mary burst into raucous laughter. "Sorry darling, I'm afraid not."

"Well crap." She'd already paid six months' rent. Couldn't move out anytime soon, not if she wanted to eat.

"Why didn't you ask me how I knew your friend was getting married?" Sherlock asked seriously and Ophelia eyes darted about, silently asking Mary and John if he was serious.

By the grave look on John's face and the barely held back giggle on Mary's, Sherlock was quite serious.

"I assumed Mrs Hudson had told you."

A muscle in Sherlock's jaw twitched and he turned around, his great big coat swirling around him and stomped off to the room at the end of the kitchen, which she assumed was his bedroom.

Ophelia was at an utter loss for words. "Umm, should I wait until he gets out or-"

"Did you have anything you wanted to talk about?" John said kindly. "I'm afraid Sherlock's going to be sulking for a-" The sound of a violin crooning interrupted him and he closed his eyes before opening them with a tight smile. "He'll be sulking for a long time."

"Right. I just wanted to know what the rules were for the common areas."

John burst into hysterical laughter. It continued for a considerable amount of time before he just sat down in the chair next to Mary's, his head dropping into his lap as he shook with the force of his chuckles.

"Right then, rules for the common areas. If Sherlock can pick the lock to it, it's a common area-"

Wait, what?"

"-that includes your laptop, mobile or any other devices that are password protected-"

What had she gotten into?

"-If you touch his experiments or clear the dining table, Sherlock will take his revenge-"

Experiments? Dining table? Revenge?

"-And no matter what, don't touch the fingers in the fridge." John finished seriously.

"And don't drink the milk, especially if Sherlock's offering. Actually, just don't take anything he offers." Mary added casually and John nodded in agreement.

"I don't suppose you guys know any place with a reasonably rent that I could look into for once the six months end."

"Oh, darling," Mary said with a wicked, wicked grin. "I highly doubt you'll last the six months."

Lovely.

* * *

 **A/N: The tags are prone to change, I have nothing planned out and that includes relationships etc. (Except for Mary and John, they're too cool to split up.)**

 **For the most part I'm probably going to keep it as an outsider observational sort of thing. Feedback would be appreciated.**


	2. Chapter 2

_2_

* * *

Her toes twitched in her boots to the rhythm of the song. Her earphones were excellent, which they really had to be considering how bloody expensive they were, and the dreary cloudy atmosphere of the world meant nothing to Ophelia as her 'Happy' playlist had her buoyant and this close to dancing in the streets.

She controlled herself, if barely. It was just such a nice day.

And she had so much free time now that her commute was cut down now that she lived in Central London. She was even willing to put up with the shitty flatmate if it meant not having to spend hours in the tube putting her elbows and her pointiest of paintbrushes to good use, stabbing that arse that had the gall to grope her.

Gene Kelly's voice crooning 'Singin' in the rain' lifted her spirits so high she couldn't help the little twirl she did, only to shriek as someone tapped her shoulder.

John Watson stood there, smiling sheepishly. His mouth was moving and she realised he was talking to her only she couldn't hear him. She yanked them off with one hand, the other poised over her heart waiting for it to clam the fuck down.

"Was that necessary?!"

"I've been calling your name for ages, you didn't hear me."

"Oh, my poor heart!" It wasn't beating quite as fast now but it was still higher than the norm.

"Heading to Baker Street then?"

"Pretty much. You?"

"Sherlock called. Apparently there's been a rather interesting murde-" He was cut off as his phone began ringing. The number on it must not have belonged to someone he liked because his face contorted to the same mixture of exasperation and exhaustion that it did with Sherlock.

It wasn't Sherlock though, obviously. As the man had repeatedly and loudly said when fighting with people, he preferred to text.

"Mycroft, what is it?"

Ophelia watched his reactions carefully. Especially because they mostly seemed ot concern her judging by the way whatever was being said on the other side of that phone had John looking straight at her.

She thought back to the story she had heard from Mary, of Sherlock's death and subsequent resurrection. Ophelia could see now why Sherlock hadn't told him he was alive. John Watson wasn't just an open book, he was an open baby book that catered to the reading ability of the youngest and slowest of children.

He was so fucking easy to read!

"Have you had your earphones in the entire time?"

"Yes."

"And your phone?"

"Airplane mode, the battery's too low." Between answering calls and playing Candy Crush, she chose Candy Crush.

"You-" He broke off and burst into loud laughter, just as a black car drew to the curb and the driver stepped out of it and looked at them pointedly. "I can't believe this!"

Ophelia opened her mouth to ask just what was going on before shutting it with a snap, deciding that she really didn't want to know.

"Come on, get in the car." John said, bobbing his head in the direction of the shiny black car.

She took a healthy step back.

"Why?"

"It's Sherlock's brother, he does this to everyone. He's sort of a politician and this is his way of vetting everyone who comes into contact with his baby brother."

John walked up to the car and held the door open for her smiling expectantly.

"Yeah, no."

She was barely a hundred meters from 221B with the shortcuts and she took advantage of it, speed walking the fuck out of there before John could say a word.

By the time she had gotten back to the flat, put her mobile to charge and washed up, the black car was outside the house again, this time instead of anyone waiting for her to get in, John and another man walked out instead. The other man looked up at where she was watching from the window, his face screwed up in annoyance and she gave him the two fingered salute, a smile on her face before pointedly putting her earphone back in.

They weren't playing anything though and when she heard the sounds of footsteps outside her door, she swung the door open hard and the man holding the doorknob stumbled inside her room with no grace whatsoever.

The lack of composure must have hurt him something fierce because he glared at her while smoothing his vest down with his hand. He cleared his throat a bit before smiling the most fake smile she had ever seen.

"Ms Evans, would you mind joining us for tea." His words said request, his tone said demand. Ophelia didn't like that.

She smiled. "No, thank you."

His polite, fake smile dropped. "I insist."

"So do I. Besides, you haven't said the magic words."

The man's face crumpled like he'd swallowed poison.

"Please?"

"Anything you want to apologise for?"

"Don't push me." He snarled.

"Don't stalk me."

His eye twitched and he took a long deep breath before smiling again. It was still fake but not quite as obvious as it had been before. "Ms Evans, I apologise for-" He had to stop to take another breath, "for stalking you. Would you please join Mr Watson, Mrs Hudson and I for tea?"

Ophelia giggled. "Well since you're asking so nicely."

His eye twitched again.

* * *

It took him a very long time to get to his point. Mycroft, as she'd just learnt, was fond of going on and on about things, which didn't go well with her own tendency to space out when people rambled. There was some intimidation thrown in as well, along with posturing and all that. It lost some effect as Mrs Hudson hovered and fussed over them and the absentee Sherlock but she got the gist.

'I have power blah blah. I know everything about you blah blah. Stalk Sherlock for me blah blah.'

"You're offering me money to spy on your baby brother?"

"He does this to everyone." John said knowingly, sighing and stuffing his gob with scones.

"Thanks but no thanks. It sounds a bit too much like a government job and that goes against eveyrhting I beleiev in."

"Anarchy?" He said snidely.

"Diverting the hard earned money of tax payers from jobs that actually need doing. As a politician you wouldn't understand, see, it involves this weird thing called personal values, and morals, and ethics."

He got the point and eventually left, grumbling about women, but not before finishing an entire tin of biscuits and two plates worth of scones.

"Sherlock said he was a stress eater but I didn't see it until now." John commented. "When I first met him, Sherlock and I had just been to a crime scene and Sherlock had run off somewhere screaming about pink suitcases. I was leaving and Mycroft commandeered all the phones around me, calling them until I finally picked one up, moved the traffic cameras around to prove his power and then when I got into the car it took me to this abandoned warehouse. Went on and on about Sherlock, this feud they had and how he was 'concerned'. Didn't figure out until later that they were brothers and when he said concerned, he actually meant concerned."

There was a hint of nostalgia and amused annoyance in his voice that had Ophelia looking at him like he was crazy.

"So this unknown man who obviously wields a shitload of power told you to get into a car that would take you to an unknown place while you're leaving a crime scene of presumably a murder and instead of running the fuck away or calling the police, you _went along with it_?!"

And she'd thought John was the sane one!


End file.
